Sports Department

BY THOMAS COTTER

2021 was our first full year as a Department and it was a year of trialling and experimentation as we aimed to build our identity and find our place within University.

We started the year with our first two events at Guild on the Green and O-Day. Here, we ran the first of a series of successful E-Sports events, hosting Mario-kart races and time trials. One of the Department’s goals for 2021 was to foster the E-Sports culture at UWA and to reflect the growth of E-Sports (a multimillion-dollar industry), as well as its validity as a professional sport. We ran a suite of E-Sports events with UWA Anime and the E-Sports club, including bringing E-Sports back to Inter-Faculty Sports.

This year we also worked hard to build relationships with UWA Sport, collaborating on several of our events and initiatives. We re-established the Student Stakeholders Reference Group, an initiative conceived in 2016. The group consists of UWA students from various areas of sport on campus and serves as a point of student representation for sporting related matters. So far, we have discussed matters such as inclusion, volunteer recognition, and intervarsity competition, and are excited to see how this group evolves in the future. We also worked together to run Inter-Faculty Sports, a free, weekly social sport competition between Faculty Societies. After only being able to run a few sports in 2020, it was a sigh of relief to be able to run almost every fixture this year. We were also able to introduce new sports, such as seated volleyball with the Access Department.

By far our biggest, most significant project for the year has been our six-week Women and Non-Binary Gym Series. The event was run in collaboration with UWA Sport, the Women’s Department, and the Pride Department – aimed to help more women and non-binary students gain the skills and confidence to join and use the gym. The event has been nothing short of a success, with registrations having to be capped within 24 hours, and high attendance throughout the six weeks.

Overall, it has been a busy, but fulfilling year for the Department. All the best to next year’s Sports Representative Joseph, and his committee, as they lead the Department in what will be another great year in 2022!